July 2009: 189,297 km2 of imagery added to Bing Maps

Throughout July 2009, Microsoft has added 189,297 km2 of imagery to Bing Maps. In other terms, this is apparently equivalent to 41TB of new satellite imagery, aerial photography, and vector data (all new roads in Japan). Compared to the previous month it's a huge improvement (Microsoft didn't add anything, or at least didn't say it did) but compared to May 2009 it's a slight decrease. We're staying on top of the releases to see whether Microsoft is adding more or less as Bing matures.

Last month's release includes 164 updates across 38 countries. Here's the exact breakdown, according to Microsoft:

Ortho Aerials

7,535

United States

7,452

Belgium

9

Finland

5

Germany

64

Sweden

5

Satellite

165,475

Angola

556

Australia

11,677

Brazil

1,802

Chile

4,527

China

13,594

Congo, the Democratic Republic of the

711

Cuba

5,803

Fiji

323

France

3,474

Guinea

947

India

16,410

Ireland

321

Kiribati

968

Korea, Republic of

16,958

Maldives

22,077

Mexico

11,720

Nauru

381

New Caledonia

1,951

New Zealand

7,620

Philippines

2,458

Pitcairn

323

Russian Federation

2,955

Samoa

668

Senegal

1,217

Sri Lanka

934

Taiwan, Province of China

3,094

United States

31,752

Vanuatu

254

United Kingdom

3,402

Austria

132

Oblique

12,753

Netherlands

933

Spain

1,113

United Kingdom

663

Italy

1,102

Australia

3,603

Canada

3,318

United States

2,021

Grand Total

189,297

To see what's new, check out the Bing Maps World Tour (Silverlight required), a web application hosted on Windows Azure and built with the Bing Maps Silverlight Control CTP. Essentially it's an interactive showcase of the imagery updates released every month. You can check out the updates by clicking on the pin corresponding to an update, or you can watch a slideshow that takes you around the world to explore the new content. Also, you can filter the imagery by Aerial versus Bird's eye, or by continent.

If Silverlight isn't your thing, just head over to maps.bing.com and have a look around yourself.